“Some officials have tried to play down expectations of dismissals after the Games, with Putin’s Olympic organiser Dmitry Kozak saying there would be no “outbreak” of investigations after they end. Officials are mindful that any such outbreak could hinder efforts to develop the site further for a meeting of the G8 leading industrial countries in June and the Formula One Grand Prix in October, so it might pay to stay quiet.”

“We are not as good as we would like to be at this point and [there are] still many things to discover and many things to improve, but at least we are able to do 160 laps in two days with not big, big issues in the car.”

“There are ‘appointment terminated’ notices for Ecclestone with Formula One World Championship Ltd, Formula One Hospitality and Events Services Ltd, Formula One Management Ltd and Formula One Administration Ltd, the major operating companies of the group. These are all dated January 21.”

“The car would be illegal; below the weight limit; you name it. It would be stripped right down to the bare minimum. They would have removed the steering wheel and pedals if they could have got away with it.”

Comment of the day

One reader has already succumbed to the temptation of placing a bet on the upcoming season:

Got exited and placed a bet on Magnussen taking the drivers’ championship this year.

McLaren seem to have a great car, consistently fast, reliable engine, have had plenty of time to develop the 2014 car cause of last year, and a talented driver. I think he will easily beat Button. Besides, odds were worth betting on.

LOL I’m sure they could at least give the gay driver half points at the Russian GP! It would be legal and everything with Putin’s new law.
And Bernie could say he only deserved half points because he was winning the race to make children gay.

It’s heartening to see that most F1 fanatics here have good hearts – indeed I would say, by a quick estimate of pro and con comments here, that Bernie’s 90% is correct – only the other way around. It’s always an enigma with this guy to know how much of what he says is just meant to stir things up, but regardless, what a total ****.

I have emailed the FIA as well as some of the top teams asking them of their opinions on Ecclestone’s latest comments and whether they think their sponsors would be happy being involved in a sport that could now be viewed as anti-gay. Obviously the sport isn’t anti-gay but to someone from outside the sport looking in, you have one of the most instantly recognisable F1 personalities who also happens to pull most of the strings behind the scenes making clear anti-gay comments and siding with Putin with his views.

I wouldn’t be surprised if most of the teams are very unhappy with Ecclestone’s comments on this. What happens if a a CEO of a leading F1 sponsor is gay or has someone gay in their close family? They aren’t going to want to hang around!

I wouldn’t get too crazy about what Bernie is saying, because he probably doesn’t even believe it himself. The man is a master of distraction, and says crazy things like this all the time, because it diverts attention away from something else – in this case his legal issues. He’s done this many times before; the sprinklers, the medals etc – it’s all designed to stir up controversy (which judging by the comments above it certainly has) and get people talking about something else.

The man isn’t an idiot, he can’t have lasted this long in business if he was. It is unfortunate that he’s the face of our sport to some extent, and that the general public might hear of this and it affect the sport’s perception, but there is a purpose to what he’s doing, however selfish that is.. Maybe if we just ignore these stunts he pulls they wouldn’t happen so often :)

Bernie has done a lot of good for the sport, but between this and his comments on women, I do think his ‘bosses’ need to skip the power struggle and just find someone who can replace Bernie before he’s passed on, in prison, or starts disrespecting people because of their skin color/religion.

Look, to be honest I’d be more outraged by Bernie’s comments if I wasn’t so sure they were a. to deflect attention from the court hearing and b. to keep Putin (i’d like to make a comment about the Spanish meaning of the word here except I don’t want to get Keith into trouble with MI5) on side until the Russian GP is run. It might be his actual opinion (and if it is, then shame on him) but Bernie has been known to change his opinions magically when the $$$ sign appears. That is his only real moral compass (and I use that term very loosely).